Guys and girls,
Thank you all for the inputs and thoughts.
But,

The RAT heating working on the ground should NOT have anything (alone) to do with the cause of the accident.
OK, they returned because it was heating on the ground.
They MEL-ed it, maybe the wrong way, because the heater was not inoperative! It was working just fine!
Question should be; did maintenance do the correct procedure?

All of this has nothing to do with a flapless (slats?) take-of! (besides the TOWS) but i don´t think you can blame MD/BOEING/SPANAIR-procedures/MAINTENANCE for pilots trying to get airborne not configured as briefed.

I know, a lot of things will come together and will have some kind of a influence of the whole accident.

For me the question remains: Why did they try to get airborne without flaps without having the proper speeds for that? Rush? Overconfident?

El Pais article 21/9
 

Excellent article, it has it all: Civil Aviation approved Spanair SOP without the Boeing recomendation, Mapjet (incident Lanzarote) informed CAIAC of their conclusions and recomendations in January this year, still no CAIAC report on this incident etc.

Interesting detail: (ARE) because the cb's are being pulled very often by maintenance personnel to put the a/c in air logic on the ground, the white ring got dirty and it being in a remote area of the panel, it was easy for pilots to overlook that it was not put back...

The article cites Mapjet who claim that they got away with their flapless takeoff because of the higher power of the MD83, lower TOW, head wind and crew action (deploy flap)

I m sure a lively public debate will start now in Spain...

R2-5 probably failed in air mode. That would cause RAT heater and take off warning to both fail in air mode.












r

A final horror scenario..
 

I really hope I'm wrong about thisone...

Looking at the video of the final stages of the accident, it has been
puzzling me how far and fast the acf plunged through the terrain.

We know that;
- The pilots engaged the reversers shortly after impact
- The #1 reverser got deployed
- The #2 reverser was stowed/inop
- The reverser buckets/mechanisms detached from the engines shortly
after impact.

Lets say the pilots engaged the reverser(s) shortly after impact in an
attempt to slow the acf down. Then the #1 reverser bucket gets
ripped off shortly after.
- Wouldn't this engine now produce FORWARD thrust?

With regard to the #2 reverser, it was stowed as we know. However,
what would happen if the pilots (in panic) tried to reverse thisone?
Would this #2 engine also produce FORWARD thrust?

The pilots would offcourse not know the reverser buckets were missing
and have no idea they instead of slowing the acf, added thrust!

The obvious reason for speculating is offcourse that this
might have had a significant impact on the tragic outcome of this accident.
If this was the case, they were doomed to disaster.. .

XPM

What about the flap alarm 2 days before the crash ?
 

I did not find discussed in the thread the statement (allegedly based on first-hand evidence) that the maintenance log has an entry, 2 days before the crash, reading "Sistema auto slat falla cuando se extienden los slats" (auto slat failure upon slat extension); a failure that according to the article recurred on subsequent flights.
El sistema de despegue falló dos días antes de la tragedia / EL MUNDO

What exactly is this "auto slat failure" warning?

TIA - a puzzled engineer

That's terrible, XPMorten. I also hope you're wrong, and that the turbine with the blocked reverse had some system that somehow impeded that perverse behaviour...

But you are probably, terribly right, I fear...

XXXavier

No. When you pull up the thrust reverse lever, the throttle is blocked by an interlock mechanism until the reverser is deployed. If the reverser is locked out nothing will happen.

TWT

Grabbed a notch of flap after some serious ar#e twitching.It's not something I'm very proud of and still gives me shivers when I think about it.You asked so there you have an honest answer.

These accidents could be prevented by haveing a third crew memeber on the flightdeck,he is called a flight engineer.

TU-154
 

In the mid-90's I flew Balkan Airlines (Tu-154) from Harare (Zimbabwe) to the UK stopping 4 times. Plane completely full of pax, high altitude runway, though fortunately very long. Plane rotated but did not take off. Nose was lowered, engine noise increased noticeably and we continued for several seconds more before second rotation and liftoff, right at the end of the runway. Most anxious moment I have ever had as a passenger. I wonder now if flaps/slats were incorrectly set, but I am not sure of this type. Anyone know more about this Tupolev type and configuration?

raredata

Kudos to you for bringing that to pprune. That could easily have been the end of you and your pax.

The flaps on my a/c are so slow that your 'recovery' would not have time to work.

I've learnt from this thread.

I always triple check we've got flap out now before pushing the levers up.:ok:

Lots of unwanted failures occur in a crash most of which lead to very high decelleration forces, rather than the other way arround. Once you hit the ground hard enough to break the airplane you no longer consider the consequences as in the causal chain.

Raredata
 

Appreciate your candour.Can happen to anyone.

Dug the dog, you are incorrect.

As a Loadmaster years ago, I was on a Zantop L188 at Arlanda, as the 3 man crew hurtled down the runway the audible flap warning horn went off and saved much embarrasment !!!, A rapid exit to the left and taxy back to the hold with tail between legs.

Why..because they were all so engrossed in chitter chatter, that they missed the checklist item. The F/E was English...talked a lot ( Still does ! )...and was responsible for the call..and he is still flying with DHL.

Another loadie friend of mine took off on a JBQ L188 out of Coventry at MTOM where they had forgot the flaps, HE said Warwick Castle looked mighty big that day and that the Electra was a mighty forgiving beast.

Thread drift..apologies..but even a 3/4 man crew can balls up

Thanks raredata and freightdoggy for you honest contributions.

We all appreciate it.

And remember, I personally DO NOT BLAME THE PILOTS and consider it an "honest" mistake on their side (with the information I have in hand, it seems they did try to follow the checklist reasonably appropiately).

Between the pilot and the copilot they had about 22 years of flight experience (it takes two to tango, albeit 19 from the pilot and only 3 for the copilot). And, presumably, they only forgot to flip this one important switch just once.

They are not the only pilots in the world to ever forget it. They are just the ones that, every 10 years of so in the industry, have other factors aligned to produce the result (TOWS inop unkwoningly, wind/weight/density/thrust, unable to recorver, etc).

Hopefully mandatory TOWS tests before each flight and other measures will be implemented that makes it harder for everyone to make this kind of mistakes in the future.

And today, it's been a month and two days from the date of the accident. And against their own regulations, as it's common with them, the CIAIAC adds another case in which not even a preliminary report has been published (this month, they have about 5 cases "overdue").

Remember that nobody expects these preliminary FACTUAL reports to be highly accurate or contain much information. Just to state facts that, as of today, are fairly well known and proven, without drawing (necessarily if it's too early) conclusions etc.

But no. They have to keep everything "ultrasecret" (if it was up to then) and not publish anything until "they, the experts" consider when and what we mere mortals can know and what WE CAN'T.

Inquiry timeline details Spanair MD-82 crash sequence

CIAIAC draft report now out.

I wonder how many of the deceased agree with you!!!!
:ugh:

You don't blame them?
Fair enough.. but they mucked up.
And these things can be avoided.. such as an aborted take off or just remembering the flaps in the first place :ugh:

But yeh, I'm not in a position to judge. :E

wow, 15 minutes from leaving the stand until brakes released. I know the taxi routes are long at MAD, wonder if there was a takeoff queue? I was convinced one time where we had a short taxi and the HP757 was taking rwy 32L at ORD that a friendly AA F100 crew told my sleepy pilots to maybe throw down a little flap. Guess it saved them from the horn, but if it was malfunctioning.....
I always thought of other more alert crews as a bonus last safety check, but only when there's queues.

Clearifications of MD 80 systems
 

I Have seen that people are specutaling in how the Flap /systems mechanicly are working on the MD80 aircraft. I just wanted to clearify that neither the flap or the slat systems are actuated with so called screw jacks, they are fully hydraulical. Like posted earlier the slat is controlled by an dual actuator oval drum located in the mid section of center wing box.Wires on both sides of that oval drum will pull the flap either in or out. Due to the type of constuction and pure gravity rules it will stay as selected even is hydraulical failure accures or if left up during night.So that actuator positon would may tell you if slats were actually selected out. However the flap is contolled by hydraulical actuators at each end of the flap and they will just follow command from lever in cockpit via hydraulical/mechanical followup system to get to position selected. However the flap WILL fall down if left unattended (with hydraulic off) i.e during night stop. That is just pure gravity versas hygraulic internal leak slowly letteing fluid pass the actuators. When coming in the morning to the aircraft the flap will be anywere from 8-25 deg down until hydraulics applied again. That is normal. And there is no real time limits for how fast the flap is allowed to fall down with hydraulics off, I have asked. Generally the older the aircraft the faster they will fall down.Thats why I would not belive so much how the actuators are found since they could have moved easily when hydraulics failed during crash.
Also several people seems to ask about beacon light etc etc. Only light on the MD 80 that is controlled by WOW is strobelight and that IS controled by the L/H GND ctrl relay C/B and which if im not wrong is from main gear wow.But some functions like ( avionic cooling fan) will also be actuated by only nose wow-that is noted when taxying light and the nose oleo straights out and then for a moment it becomes quiet in the cockpit dur to avionic cooling gets off).
Then how to test the T/O warning system is done before engine start by just advancing the throttles verifying brakes ON first and stab NOT set and flaps UP then by advancing the throttles all the appropriate warning will come on auraly one by one.Also when advancing the throttle the outflowvalve starts closing and the yellow wheel on center pedestal starts turning fwd indication towards closing and also that the system is in automatic mode since it is always in manual mode (and closed ) during night stop or if the aircraft is left for a longer time.severar things to check with just throttle movement( and ofcourse free full movement)
That must obviously have been missed.


regards

Wings1011